Dear Cars.com,
I would like to volunteer to participate in the email program that you recently pulled. I must say, Cars.com, I am a little disappointed in your missed opportunity to defend yourself.
To begin with, I am a dealer. I am not an industry expert, nor do I give a Google about MOST of the arguments made on both sides of this discussion. I am used to dealing with mathematics and that is exactly why this topic interests me.
Let me make sure I understand correctly.
I get a lead on one of the vehicles that I have listed with you. Check.
I have three full days to work that lead and then you send them an email with my vehicle and possibly some competing vehicles. Check. (and yet another email a few days later…)
If ANOTHER dealer gets a lead on one of THEIR vehicles, then Cars.com sends THEIR lead emails a few days later with perhaps one of MY vehicles in it. Check.
So my vehicle was exposed to the customer on the initial lead (exposure #1), then in the first email (#2), then in the second email (#3), and possible in my competitors first (#4) and second (#5) emails on a like vehicle. Check.
If I am following up with my leads better than my competition, then my inventory simply gets exposed to more customers with more frequency, whether it is my store’s initial lead and the subsequent follow-up emails or the result of your follow-up emails to my sleepy competitors.
More vehicle exposures + more customers + good follow-up processes + thoughtful pricing/quality photos/good descriptions = More Sales
If I feared my competition, this program would terrify me.
But, until that day comes……….Sign me up.
Who’s your Danny?
Comments
Do you see this...?
http://automotiveinternetsales.com/profiles/blogs/confessions-of-an...
I hear you Danny! And thanks!
Absolutely! That's like eating salads all day and still gaining weight. Makes you want to eat a damn pizza! When I said bigger or smaller, I should have clarified bigger budget and smaller budget. Truth is that piggybacking is going go on. One giving the ride, the other getting the ride. My bet is that your competition isn't chiming in on these message boards.
The cool thing is...we are saying the exact same thing. If the money you are spending is not relative to the results you expect (because of the policies of your vendor), then it's time to cut your spend or cut bait altogether. My point is that that other dealer will have enjoyed the ride in the process.
Fight the good fight, Steve. It's nice to see dealers who care enough to engage in these types of healthy discussions.
In our case, the Toyota store (which has been around for decades) sells more cars than us (who've only been here 4 years). But we are aggressively seeking to conquest some business and so we spend more than they do. Regardless of all that, if you spend more you should get more. If you spend more, you should expect that your increased spend is not subsidizing your competition, whether they are bigger or smaller (that is irrelevant). So yes, we would be upset if our larger spending benefits those who spend less, thereby incentivizing us to cut our spend.
Does that make sense?
It's funny how both Steve and Chip are correct.
In Steve's original scenario, I am, for all intensive purposes, the smaller Toyota dealer you spoke of. What is good for one dealer is not necessarily good for another. That's why I stand by my original statement that there is not really a universal conclusion. One size does NOT fit all. If Cars.com's new gadget benefits smaller dealers with minimal ad budgets while penalizing larger dealers, then who would blame the smaller dealer for riding that pony?
Thie big picture. Cars.com's big spending clients don't like this product. So now it is cancelled.
Welcome to my world.
Sincerely,
Small Fish
Big Pond, USA
Chip, respectfully I have to disagree with you on the power banners and used featured listings. They do not generally result in a high click thru rate and I have learned not to expect that. We get more click thrus to our site from a local TV station's website than we do from Cars and Autotrader combined. The banners and featured listings are really more branding to encourage people to view our listings while they are on Cars.com, and yes, our VDP have gone up tremendously since we added these features.
But had they continued down the road they were going, we would have pulled all of the extras and just ran basic inventory listing and just leeched off of the other dealer's submissions. That would be the inevitable outcome. Fortunately, Cars.com came to their senses.
I happen to agree with Danny. If you are better than your competitors you will win with this new Cars.com program. I for one think more on the lines as the cup is half full than half empty. I see this as an opportunity to keep the client engaged with my car along with getting my cars out to clients that may not have selected one of my vehicles the first time around.
If your teams process is good and you get back with your clients and give them reasons to come in and visit you sooner than later you should run into few if any problems. I personally do not fear the competition of other dealers and actually welcome it.
As to the banner ads and power positions unless they link back to Cars.com any lead submitted from there should, I would assume, be coming from your website. In this case Cars.com would not be involved with the lead at all.
Let’s face it. If we are doing our jobs this should not and will not hurt us. I for one think there are many other things as dealers we should be concerned with. If dealers don’t like what Cars.com is doing stop using them.
Addendum to the above:
* Assumption -- all other things (quality of descriptions, photos, followup procedures, etc.) of the competing dealers being equal.
My letter would be more like this:
Dear Cars.com,
Under the test parameters as best I know:
If I spend more money with you than all the other local dealers, investing in multiple Premium banner, Used Power Position Banners, Used Specials, etc. - I should expect to get more exposure, more VDPs, and more submissions than my competitors who do not purchase these add-ons, correct? - Check
My competitors will therefore get a boost in the VDP links being sent out to prospects who inquired on one of my cars, a boost that I will not see from them due to the fact that they do not spend the extra money with you correct? - Check?
If one of those competitors happens to be a Toyota dealer and we are not, but we happen to have a nice Camry that gets a lot of submissions, the local Toyota dealer who has several Camrys for sale will have an advantage over me when the followup emails are sent out, correct? - Check
Question: Wouldn't it be in our interest as a dealer to reduce our spend with you to be on a more even playing field? - Check
Which is exactly what I suggested we would do if they had persisted. Our rep sent that message to his superiors including the VP yesterday. He called me back a couple hours later and said they basically said "you win".